A Touch of Death hcc-17

by Charles Williams

  “All right,” I said savagely. “I did. How much do you want? Half? Don’t go any higher than that, because I’ve still got one thing in my favor. I’ve got the keys, and if I don’t get half nobody gets anything.”

  She leaned back a little in the chair and smiled. “That sounds eminently fair to me. But did it ever occur to you that possibly there was another facet to it, aside from the

  money? Remember? It was something I told you.”

  “What?”

  “That I have a deep-seated aversion to being played for

  a fool. You could have saved yourself all this if you’d told me the news to begin with.”

  Everybody who wanted to believe that could line up on the right. But I went along with her.

  “Well, I’m sorry,” I said. “But that’s all past now. So the fifty-fifty split is O.K. with you?”

  She didn’t answer for a moment. She was looking thoughtfully down at her coffee cup. Then she said, “Yes. If we still feel we want to separate when we get to the West Coast, that sounds quite fair to me.” I glanced quickly at her. “What do you mean?” She raised her eyes then. There was more Susie than Madelon Butler in them. “You don’t make it very easy for me to say, do you? But I meant just that. Maybe we won’t want to separate by the time we get there.”

  “It’s funny,” I said slowly. “I had thought of that too.” There was a faint, tantalizing smile about her lips. “Changing into someone else isn’t a thing that happens only from the skin out. I told you I wasn’t acting Susie Mumble. I am Susie. And I’m becoming fascinated with her. For the past few days I’ve been increasingly conscious of unsuspected possibilities in Susie, and I was rather hoping you were too.”

  Chapter Twenty

  I started to get up.

  She shook her head, smiling. “No, Lee. Don’t rush me. Remember, Susie is something so foreign to my entire life up to this time that I can’t hurry her. She has to do her own developing, in her own way. You understand, don’t you?”

  She stopped abruptly, and before I could say anything, she added, “But enough of this. We’ve got work to do.”

  We went in and sat down on the sofa. She was excited now. I put the three keys on the glass top of the coffee table. She separated them, pushing them out one at a time.

  “Third National,” she murmured happily, “Mrs. Henry

  L. Carstairs. Merchants Trust, Mrs. James R. Hatch. Seaboard Bank and Trust, Mrs. Lucille Manning.” It was easy now that she had won. Well, almost won. I put the keys back in my wallet.

  She looked at her watch. “It’s a quarter of eight. The banks won’t open until ten. I’ve got to go to the beauty shop first, and buy some clothes.”

  I exploded. “Hold it! Don’t you realize we haven’t got time for that? They know I’m here in town. Every minute of delay is dangerous.”

  She broke in on me. “Not while you’re here in the apartment. And I can’t go into those banks like this. My hair may look all right to you, but to another woman it’s as ragged as if it had been chewed off. And these clothes are terrible. I look like a ragpicker. People would notice, and that’s the one thing we can’t risk. I have to look like someone who conceivably might have a safe-deposit box.”

  In the end I gave in. I had to. As she pointed out, she’d be back by twelve, which was a delay of only two hours. And I didn’t want to queer it by starting a fight now.

  She called a number of beauty shops until she found one that would take her right away. I gave her two hundred dollars of the bankroll. She called a cab and left.

  Just before she opened the door to go out she turned and faced me. That same tantalizing smile was on her face.

  “I just happened to think,” she said. “When I came in this door I was Madelon Butler. And now I’m going out for the first time as Susie Mumble. Would you like to help me set the mood?”

  I helped her. Not that she needed much. The way Susie’s mouth felt on mine, they could pour her into the mold any time now. She was a finished product.

  She clung to me for a moment. “It won’t be long now, will it?”

  “No,” I said.

  It certainly wouldn’t.

  But it would be long enough.

  I walked the floor. I smoked chain fashion. I listened for the elevator, going through that same old hell of waiting every time it stopped. This would be the time they would come, right at the end when I had it won. In the last four hours.

  In the last three hours....

  In the last two....

  And now, on top of that, I was tightening up just thinking of that trip downtown. That was going to be rugged. The city would be swarming with cops looking for me.

  I’d be in the car all the time, though, and that would help. Of course, they had an idea now of what the car looked like, but there were thousands of the same kind and the cop had no chance to see the license plates. The main thing in my favor was the fact that it’s hard to tell the size of a man sitting down in a car. And it was my size they were depending on to spot me.

  I set the last of it in my mind. I’d tell her we were going to go right on out the highway the minute she came out of the last bank. That would ease her mind as to why I insisted on going along instead of letting her do it alone now that we were all lovey-dovey. But then, at the last minute, I’d think of some reason we had to come back here before we shoved. And when I left here I’d be alone. I wondered if she really thought I was stupid enough to go for that Susie Mumble act. When we had all the money out of the banks, together in one bundle in a suitcase, and I was the last person on earth who knew she was still alive?

  The first time my eyes closed I’d grow a pair of scissors out of my throat.

  But I had her stopped now.

  I went to the desk and wrote out the note to the police. I put the note inside an envelope, addressed and stamped it, and slipped it into the inside pocket of the coat I was going to wear. I’d mail it at some outlying box on my way out of town to be sure it wasn’t delivered for at least twelve hours. That would be better than mailing it a day or so later from some other city. That way, they’d know which direction I’d gone.

  Twelve hours would do.

  If you had $120,000 in your pocket and were no longer being sought for murder, twelve hours’ start was fair enough.

  When we came back to the apartment all I had to do was take all her clothes, including the ones she had on, and throw them down the garbage chute, and leave her. She wouldn’t be likely to go anywhere naked. She’d still be here when the police showed up to collect her.

  Of course she would scream her head off and give them, a good description and tell them who I was, but they had practically all that already. And the big heat would be off. Even if they caught me, they couldn’t lean very hard. Not like murder.

  My nerves were so tight now they were singing. I couldn’t sit still at all. It was eleven. It was eleven-fifteen. I had to fight myself to get my eyes off the clock long enough to give it a chance to move. Every time I heard the elevator stop I would stand there for an eternity, waiting for the knock on the door.

  Then I remembered that when she came back she would have to knock on the door to get in. I wondered if I would be able to open it.

  She came. It was ten minutes of twelve, and somehow I got the door open.

  They’d done a job on her hair. It was like polished copper rings. She was excited and gurgling, carrying a big hatbox and three other bundles.

  “Wait till you see me dressed up,” she said.

  “Hurry it up. For God’s sake, hurry.”

  She disappeared into the bedroom. I waited, feeling my insides tie up in knots. Being so near the end of it made it terrible.

  Ten minutes later she came out, walked past me into the center of the room without saying a word, and turned slowly, like a model.

  She was Susie, all right. And Susie was a confection, with frosting.

  The big floppy picture hat was perched on the side of her head as if it
had been nailed to the shining curls. She had on just a shade too much lipstick across a mouth just a shade too wide. The flowery summer dress was short-sleeved and it snuggled lovingly against Susie’s natural resources and scenic high points as if it couldn’t bear to be torn away. The white shoes were only straps and three-inch heels, and the nylons were ultrasheer with elaborate clocks. She was wearing long white gloves, which showed up the tan of her arms.

  Susie was right off the barracks wall.

  “Well,” she asked coyly, “how do you like your creation?”

  “Brother!” I said. Then time came running back and fell in on me again. “Look, I can drool later. Let’s get going.”

  “All right,” she said. Then she glanced quickly at my face. “Lee! You haven’t shaved.”

  I’d forgotten that. I’d meant to after that shower, but it had slipped my mind. That was what pressure could do. “Well, the hell with it. We haven’t got time.”

  Then I put a hand up to my face, remembering. I not only hadn’t shaved. I hadn’t shaved for three days.

  I cursed. But there was no use just asking people to stare at me. I ran into the bathroom, yanking off the shirt and tie. While I lathered and scraped I heard her rustling around in the bedroom.

  I came out. She was waiting.

  “I’ll need something to put the money in,” she said. “There’s a lot of it. Physically, I mean.”

  “We’ll stop somewhere and buy a briefcase,” I said impatiently. “No, wait. How about that overnight bag of yours?”

  “Certainly. I hadn’t thought of that. It’ll do nicely, and I’m not taking the old clothes anyway.” She went into the bedroom and came out carrying the bag.

  I put on the coat, which had been hanging on the back

  of a chair.

  We were ready.

  “All right,” I said. “Let’s go.”

  When we stepped out onto the street I could feel the skin along my back draw up hard and tight with chill. But by the time we had casually walked the block to the car and got in, it wasn’t so bad. I took the sunglasses out of the glove compartment and put them on.

  I drove slowly. Traffic was heavy. It was a hot, still day, and I could feel myself sweating beneath the coat.

  I watched the traffic lights. I watched the other cars. If we had an accident now...

  But we didn’t. Nothing happened. Once a squad car pulled up alongside us in the other lane and I could feel my nerves knot up, but the two cops paid no attention to us. They went on past and turned the corner.

  We were downtown now, in the thick of traffic. I couldn’t turn left into Avalon, where the Seaboard Bank and Trust and the Third National were, so I had to go around the block.

  The first time through there wasn’t a parking place anywhere in the two blocks between the banks. Next time our luck was better. I found one just a half block beyond the Seaboard. There was a half hour on the meter.

  I took out the first two keys and handed them to her. “I’ll wait right here while you make both of them. After you come out of the Seaboard, walk on down to the Third National. When you’re finished there, walk back this way and stand diagonally across on the corner up there. I’ll see you. I can turn left there, so I’ll pick you up and we’ll be headed for the Merchants Trust.”

  She smiled, crinkling up her eyes. “Watch Susie’s walk,” she said. She was as cool as a mint bed.

  She got out, carrying the little suitcase.

  I watched her. I saw her cross the street behind me. She went up the steps into the bank.

  I waited.

  My nerves crawled. It was almost physically impossible to sit still. I lit cigarettes. I threw them out after two puffs. I pretended to be looking for something in the glove compartment, to keep my face down. Another patrol car went slowly past in the traffic. It was a black shark, cruising, deadly, not quite noticing, easing past, gone. I unclenched my hands.

  It was hot. I became aware that I was counting. I didn’t know what I was counting; I was just saying numbers. I tried to follow her in my mind. Where was she now? She had to go through the bank to the rear, down the steps, through the massive doorway. She signed the card, she gave her key to an attendant in the shiny corridors between walls of steel honeycomb. Now she was going into one of the booths, closing the door, sliding the lid off the box, transferring the money to the overnight bag, coming out....

  Up the steps, through the bank, out the doorway, down the steps outside....

  I stared into the rear-view mirror.

  There she was.

  She came out. She flowed down the steps with the sexy indolence of Susie and sauntered across the street behind me. She came up the sidewalk, and as she passed the car she turned her face and smiled. One eye closed ever so slightly in a wink.

  One away.

  I waited again. I was watching the parking meter now. It was getting close. I wished I had asked her to put a nickel in it. If the flag dropped I had to get out and do it. I didn’t want to get out. I felt in my pocket.

  I didn’t have a nickel. I watched the meter. Sweat ran slowly down my face. It had three minutes left on it when I saw her cross the

  street ahead of me and stand on the corner, waiting.

  I picked her up. My shirt was wet. My hands trembled. I couldn’t wait for her to get the door closed. “Did you get it?” I demanded. “Was it all right? Did you have any trouble?”

  She laughed softly. “Not a bit. Take it slowly, so you’ll miss that next light. I want to show you something.”

  The light caught us. I stopped. “Open it,” I whispered. I felt as if I were being strangled. “Open it!”

  She had the overnight bag in her lap. She unsnapped the two latches, smiling at me out of the corners of her eyes. “Look.”

  She raised the lid just a couple of inches. I looked in. I forgot everything else. It was worth it. It was worth everything I had gone through. It was beautiful. I saw twenties, fifties, hundreds, in bundles. In fat bundles

  girdled with paper bands.

  I wanted to plunge my hands into it.

  “Watch,” she whispered. She slid a white-gloved hand in under the lid and broke one of the bands and stirred the loosened bundle with a caressing slowness that was almost sexual. I watched, gripping the wheel until my fingers hurt.

  She snapped the lid shut. I took the other key out of my wallet and gave it to her. We were still waiting for the light. When she had put the key in her purse I reached over and took her hand. I squeezed it. She squeezed back.

  “Look,” I whispered, “after we’ve finished this last one, let’s go back to the apartment. Just for a few minutes, before we start. Susie wouldn’t mind, would she?”

  She gave me a sidelong glance and said, “I don’t think she would. Not for just a few minutes.”

  She had slid the bag back a little in her lap and she was straightening the seams of her stockings, doing it deliberately and very slowly, one long lovely leg at a time. She turned her face just slightly so her eyes were smiling obliquely up at me from under the curving lashes.

  “After all,” she said softly, “it was Venus, wasn’t it, who breathed life into Galatea?”

  It was wonderful. Oh, Lord, it was wonderful.

  I could hardly hear her now. The whisper was tremulous, catching in her throat. “This is shameless, isn’t it? In brilliant sunlight, in the middle of town. I— I think Susie is going to be a revelation to both of us. Oh, won’t that light ever change?”

  If she didn’t shut up and stop it I’d go crazy right there in the street. I had to look away from her.

  It was terrific. If you lived twenty consecutive life times you’d never run across anything quite like it. I almost missed the light, just thinking of the beauty of it.

  She had outguessed them all, and she thought she had outguessed me. And now we were going back to the apartment, we were going to launch the tremulous and smoldering Susie, and I was going to walk out when it was done with $120,000 I’d
never have to divide with anybody. And not only that. The thing that made it an absolute masterpiece was the fact that now I wouldn’t even have any battle to get those clothes so I could throw them down the garbage chute. She’d help me. She’d help me all the way.

  You would never beat it. You would never approach it again.

  Horns were blasting behind us. I snapped out of it.

  The street the Merchants Trust was on was one of the main drags, and I couldn’t turn left into it either. I had to go around the block again.

  We were shot with luck. A man pulled out of a parking place less than fifty feet beyond the ornate, marble-columned entrance. I slid into it. She patted my hand and got out.

  I turned my head and watched her. I watched the slow, seductive tempo of Susie’s walk. She went along the sidewalk in the sun looking like something the censors had cut out of a sailor’s dream. She went into the bank.

  It was only a few minutes more.

  I tried to light a cigarette. My hands shook. A cop came by on a motor tricycle, looking at meters. My whole back turned to ice. He went on, not even looking at me. I breathed again.

  I set the rear-view mirror so I could watch the entrance without craning my neck. I put my hands down on the seat and clenched them tightly to stop the trembling. It was being so near that made it awful. I thought of the money. I thought of the apartment bedroom, the Venetian blinds drawn, and Susie. I tried to quit thinking of both, before I exploded.

  It had to be less than five minutes now. She’d been gone—how long? I didn’t know. Time had lost all meaning. The whole world was holding its breath.

  Then I saw her.

  She came out of the bank. She walked down the steps and diagonally across the sidewalk toward the car. I could feel the sigh coming right up from the bottom of my lungs.

  It was made now. There was only that short drive back to the apartment. I started the motor and reached out a hand to open the door for her. She saw me watching her,

  and smiled.

  But she didn’t stop.

  She went right on by. The white-gloved left hand, which was carrying the purse down beside her thigh, made a little gesture as she went by the window. Three of the fingers waved.